Broken Long Ago
by A. Zap
Summary: Stan had thought that once he brought his brother back, everything would work out and be okay. Still, things between the two are as broken as ever and things are getting worse as everything falls apart. Will there ever be a chance to fix what was broken? Companion to "Crack and Break." One-shot.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Gravity Falls or any of its associated characters.  
**

 **Note: Requested by Aleja08. Thank you for the suggestion and I hope this satisfies you.**

 **Companion to the Gravity Falls story "Crack and Break."**

* * *

Broken Long Ago

"I can't believe you!" Stan shouted at his brother. "You're supposed to be the careful one!"

Ford ignored him as he rushed to place the rift into the crosshairs of some machines that would make a bigger containment field.

Stan growled and turned to Soos, who was trying to shepherd the kids out of there. Mabel was staring at Dipper in shock. Learning that her brother had lied to her had hit her hard. She had come him with her worries before about how Dipper had seemed to be drifting away. He had told her that things would be fine.

This really wasn't fine.

"Soos!" Stan called out to the handyman. "Check the perimeter and make sure no one else gets close. We don't need anyone getting hurt!"

"Aye-aye, Mr. Pines!" Soos saluted him and hurried out.

"Take the stairs!" He instructed him. After all, the breaking of the original containment field was sending out shockwaves and making everything shake. The elevator out probably wasn't going to work very well.

Stan turned back to the monitors. He'd gotten use to using them over the years he was trying to bring Ford back. Though it's not like bringing him back had changed anything. His brother hadn't even thanked him.

And he had been so hoping that they could repair their relationship.

Ford rushed back to him and looked over the monitors himself. Good, that meant that he was back in hearing range.

"I thought I told you to keep Dipper out of all of your weird stuff!" Stan shouted at him. He started to type in the commands that would raise the new field.

"He came to me! What was I supposed to do? Turn him away?" Ford's forehead wrinkled as he read the latest data; with a few quick strokes on the keyboard, the energy levels stabilized.

"Yes!" Stan said, exasperated. Wasn't his brother supposed to be the smart one? "The stuff you study is dangerous, and I didn't want either kid wrapped up in this crap!"

"He was just curious! He reminded me of myself." Ford tried to excuse himself. Stan made to argue, but a warning beep stopped him. He cursed under his breath as he tried to finalize the raising of the field.

The shaking was getting worse, not better.

Still, Stan couldn't help but throwing out his comment. "Of course, he's like you. He sticks his nose where it doesn't belong and ends up in oodles of trouble."

His brother snorted. "I never get into anything that I can't get out of."

Stan flipped some switches to bypass more power towards the field. "Really? So you asked me to take the journal away from here because everything was perfectly fine." Sarcasm dripped from his voice. "Besides, Dipper is still a kid." He reasoned.

Sparks flew up from the console, and Ford quickly shielded his face. He brought his hands down to type in more commands, most of his focus on the screen. He retorted. "I don't see what your problem is!"

"My problem is the kids getting hurt because you can't see past your mysteries!" Stan said. Was it really so hard for his brother to think about his family? Couldn't he see how important they were?

Ford straightened and glared at him. "The kids are fine."

"Oh, really?" Some of the equipment on the far wall exploded, rocking the ground. Stan had to hold his ground in this argument though. "Did you ever think about Mabel? You've been taking Dipper away from her."

Ford adjusted his glasses, his expression confused. "How exactly have I been taking him away from her? It's not like she doesn't have any other friends."

"But they're not her brother, her twin!" Why couldn't Ford understand this?

For Stan, family had always been the most important thing for him. Sure, he had wanted to explore the world for treasure, but it had always been important for him to do so with his brother by his side. That's partly why it had been such a shock that his brother would want to go to some fancy science school. It was like Ford had forgotten their promise.

That's also why Stan hadn't been able to believe that Ford had thought that he had purposely ruined his project. It had been an accident, plain and simple. Yet it had lead to the bond between them to begin breaking.

It had steadily eroded away over the next ten years. Stan had wanted to go back, but he had vowed to show that he could make it on his own. He couldn't go crawling back.

He had been happy to receive that postcard. He had thought that it was an opportunity for them to get back together and fix things, that they could be the Mystery Twins again. For a second, Ford had let him believe that as he talked about their old plans.

Then Ford had immediately dashed his hopes, as he told him to go alone.

The fight had been so stupid, and all of his anger at his brother hadn't been worth the sight of seeing him being sucked into some sort of portal thing. He had thought that he had lost his brother forever. Stan had studied and studied, more than he had in his entire life, trying to figure out all of the machinery that was in his twin's labs.

All of it had been to get his brother back. Now he had him, but he hadn't even seemed glad to see him.

Now, he regretted all of that work a bit, even though he had spent 30 years working on it. It had lead to this situation and it wasn't just him who was in danger, it was Dipper and Mabel too.

Those kids had been a surprise to him. He had come to a few of their earliest birthdays, but he hadn't wanted to leave Gravity Falls much so he didn't really know them. Stan had been shocked when their parents had called him to ask for them to stay the summer.

At first, he had just thought that they would be some cheaper labor for around the shop. They had reminded him so much of him and Ford as kids though; soon he found that he genuinely liked them and wanted to take care of them. They had become his family. He had wanted to protect them.

Stan couldn't help but think that he wasn't doing a great job at that.

"Look," he gestured around them before returning to making sure the whole system didn't blow up in their faces, "you kept secrets from me and made Dipper help you. How did you think you could control this stuff? You keep on poking the bear, and at this rate, it's going to come back to bite you just like it did all those years ago."

Ford made a frustrated noise as he turned back to his own monitor. "I have this under control."

"No, you don't!" Stan growled; the monitors blared out new warnings, and the two of them were struggling to keep up with them. Things were blowing up around them, and his brother thought that this had some semblance to control. "This is a disaster!"

He glared at the monitors. The instability of the containment fields was not lessening. It was getting worse, and even the ground seemed to be rebelling as the tremors were now causing rocks to fall from the ceiling. Everything was falling apart.

"Well, this wouldn't be happening if you hadn't opened the portal!" Ford snapped. He was typing rapidly, trying to salvage the situation.

"And you'd still be stuck in some different dimension!" Stan shouted back. "You're my brother. What was I supposed to do?"

"How about listening to me for once?" Ford pulled some levers, and then checked the screens. Stan followed his gaze, and the only thing that showed on them spelled trouble.

The lab wasn't the only thing that was falling apart.

"The containment field is breaking. We need to get out of here, or else we'll get caught in the backlash." Stan went to grab his brother's arm, but he jerked away.

"We can still stop this." Ford was fully focused on the problem, not paying attention to anything that was going on around them. He had been like that ever since they were kids, but this time, that habit was going to get him killed.

"Ford…" Stan glanced at the monitors again. They were running out of time!

"DIPPER!" Mabel shouted and he went to turn to see what was going on, because she had never sounded like that. It sounded like she was crying. Besides, she and Dipper should have gotten out of there when Soos did.

However, at the moment, the warnings reached a fever pitch and all alarms started going off. The machinery in front of Ford was sparking again, but Stan had worked with enough faulty machines in his time to be able to tell when something was just sparking and when it was about to explode.

This was one of those exploding moments.

"Get out of the way!" Stan grabbed Ford by the color of his stupid trench coat and threw him away from the danger zone. Unfortunately, that left him right next to the malfunctioning machine.

He could just make out Ford's affronted expression before everything exploded.

* * *

Ford coughed as an acrid, smokey scent filled his nostrils. He shook off some debris that had fallen on him as he straightened.

He looked around. Machines were fried; there were rocks all over as parts of the lab had collapsed. It was a mess.

 _Maybe I didn't have that as under control as I thought._ Ford admitted to himself.

Maybe Stan had been right.

He tried to take a closer look around. He had thought that he heard Mabel shouting right before everything had happened. Still, he couldn't see any sign of the kids, so they must have been closer to the exit. He wondered why they hadn't gotten out when they could have.

Stan had said that Dipper was like him. If he was, then he wouldn't have left. And if Mabel was anything like Stan, she wouldn't have left him behind.

There were no signs of them though. He would have to look more carefully for them later, once he checked out the full damage.

Ford sighed and pulled off his glasses, wiping the dust off them on the bottom of his shirt. He started walking over to the monitor he had been observing before the explosion when something caught on his shoe. Placing his glasses back on his nose, he frowned down at it.

Then, he felt his stomach drop as he recognize the item on his foot.

With a trembling hand, Ford picked up Stan's fez that he never seemed to take off.

He thought back to those final moments. He only had superficial injuries because Stan pulled him out of the way, but he still would have been right in the danger zone.

"Stan?" Ford called out, turning around with eyes trained on the ground. He was practically crushing the fez in his fist. "Stan!"

He looked around, but there was no sign of his brother. How could he have forgotten his brother for even a moment?

"Stan!" He shifted some of the rubble aside.

Once more, Stan had protected him. It was just like when they were kids and Stan would take the hits from bullies for him. Still, it hadn't occurred to him that his older brother would still do that considering all that had happened. Ford had shown him that he could take care of himself.

It should have occurred to him that Stan would still try to save him since he had given up his life by faking his death and then spent 30 years of his life trying to get him back through the portal.

Stan had done all of that for him even though he was the one who gave him that burn scar on his back.

"Stan!" Ford knew that his voice sounded panicked, but he didn't care. He hadn't been this scared in years.

Finally, he saw a scrap of black fabric. He frantically shoved the debris that covered him, ignoring the speckles of blood that dotted the rocks he pulled off. Stan was on his stomach, so he rolled him over.

A strangled cry erupted from his lips.

Blood poured from a wound on Stan's head. There were bad burns up his left arm and side. That wasn't even mentioning the bruises that were already beginning to form.

"Stan?" Ford reached out and ignored the shaking in his fingers as he searched for a pulse. He felt a small measure of relief when he felt a slight, wavering heartbeat.

He knew it wouldn't last long though.

"Come on, Stan." He tried to rouse his brother. "Wake up. We need to get you to a hospital."

There was no response.

Ford had really screwed up this time.

Since coming back, Stan had attempted several times to reconnect, but Ford had been too busy with his work. He had even involved Dipper, and it had lead to this. He had messed with things he shouldn't have. Now, he wished that he had taken Stan's offers, or at least thanked him.

After all, Stan had just been trying to repair their bond that had broken long ago. He had lost just as much as Ford had.

He couldn't wait anymore. Gathering his strength, he picked Stan up. Ford grunted under his weight, but his brother really needed to get to a hospital. At their age, these types of injuries did not foster optimism.

He was making his way towards the stairs when he spotted a pine tree hat.

"Dipper?"

A tear-streaked face lifted up to meet his gaze. Ford caught sight of the motionless body in his arms. He winced. He not only knew how his nephew was feeling at the moment, he had the double guilt of knowing that he shouldn't have let the younger twins be involved in any of this.

Ford's lips formed a thin line. "Pick her up. We're going to the hospital."

Dipper scrambled to his feet, taking extra care when picking up his sister. Determination filled his expression as he followed his great uncle.

Ford kept his eyes forward and made sure to tighten his grip on Stan.

They were going to fix this.

* * *

 _AN: As I said at the top, the idea of writing the Grunkles' point of view was requested by Aleja08. I hadn't been planning on it, but that PM made me interested in doing it. A guest also requested that I write more, so this is also for that person. There is a lot of speculation in this regarding Ford's personality, but I think I did alright based on what we've seen so far. It's not that he doesn't care about his family, he just gets caught up in whatever he's doing that he doesn't think about it. I hope you like it._


End file.
